samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Bob,
There was no measurement on the the piece of brass that I used but it should be the 1/16" size which, I believe, is the smallest tubing that they make.
The aluminum 'marks' very easily so I just hold the tubing at about a 30 degree angle and rotate it once to make each rivet.
I just 'eye ball' the rivets to about 1/8" spacing. I don't worry about exact distance as the 'eye' sees them and assumes that they are all straight and equally spaced.
Being retired, working on planes is a lot more fun (and better) than watching TV and, even though I am slow, a retired person can get a lot done 24/7/365 (every day is a Saturday!).
You'll like the kit as Nick does an excellent job of design work.

nauticom

Thanks Sam:
This will be my second Ziroli buildfinishing a Ziroli Corsair. I'm in my late 70's but still working half time I to am slow.
Thanks,
BobM

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont).

While the white paint is drying on the F4U, I worked on the F9F.
I used epoxy and microballs to epoxy all the pocket hinges and pin hinges into the elevator and rudder plus install their servos.
The air lines to the gear were put on and the landing gear installed.
An extra hole was made on the front former to put a third air tank in since the tanks are pretty small.

pic 1:
Rudder servo installed.

pic 2/3:
The F9F was put on her nose so gravity can aid in getting the epoxy and microballs into the horizontal stab and vertical fin holes to install the pocket hinges.

pic 4:
Grease put on the pocket hinges set screws to keep out epoxy.

pic 5:
pocket hinges epoxied into place.

pic 6/7:
Air lines to gear installed and gear installed onto mounts.

pic 8:
A rounded balsa stick used to get the epoxy into the hinge holes and some 3n1 oil on the hinge pins.

pic 9:
Got some nice extension retainers at Joe Nall: pretty cheap, I think 10 or 12 for 5 bucks.

pic 10:
Right elevator connected into pocket hinges.
A 'U' joint slides into brass sleeves on the elevator and rudder for easy removal in the future.

pic 11:
Elevator servo installed.
Pretty ugly having it 'sit out there' but this plane isn't too big to get real fancy.

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont)

pic 1/2:
elevator and half the rudder installed.
1/64" thick ply on bottom to bridge the gap between stab and elevator.

pic 3-5:
dry fit P-70, tail pipe, 2 fuel tanks, 3 small air tanks and two 5K ma battery packs.
I carved out a third hole for the extra air tank.
I do no sanding on the fuse with the turbine in the plane and thoroughly blow all dust out of the fuse before every install of the turbine. Those bearings turning 120,000 rpm's are a little less tolerant to dust than a gas engine bearing doing 6000 rpm's!

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont)

The two C size 5K ma batteries were taped to a large plastic tie and inserted in the front box cavity.
#6X32 bolts and blind nuts were epoxied to the turbine wood mounts and epoxied to the fuse.
Some heavy brass sheeting used to make some 'L' brackets to hold the exhaust tube to the fuse.
Finally, for tonight, a cardboard template made for a receiver tray.

pic 1:
Two 5K ma batteries (2 over 3 cells, one turned upside down for a 5 over 5 cell) taped to a large plastic tie.

pic 2:
The plastic tie will allow me to pull the batteries out for servicing.
There should be enough room in there also for the turbine battery.
Hopefully, this gives me enough nose weight without adding lead.

pic 3:
#6X32 bolts and blind nuts to hold the turbine to the wooden mounts.
The turbine was screwed to the wooden mounts to hold them in place to the fuse while the epoxy dried.

pic 4:
Some brass 'L' brackets made to hold the exhaust tube to the fuse.

pic 5:
A cardboard template cut for a tray right over the front gear.
I'm figuring the receiver and valve gear/servo on this tray and put another over this for turbine equipment (both trays to be screwed in place for serviceability).

mirce

Grate work... I am in project of building my Ziroli Panther right now, so please tell me how big fuel tank are you used?
Is for Jat Cat 80 2,5 liter fuel inaf for 10 minutes flight?

Thanks in advance...

Mirce

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Mirce,
I'm using a B&B 64 oz tank plus a sullivan 11 oz tank (total 65 oz ) and I'll be lucky to get 7 minutes on a P70.
I'm guessing that your P80 with 75 oz will probably be under 5 minutes (allowing for a 'safety' margin).

mirce

I want to use two Dubro 40 oz (2,4 liters) plus buble free tank (1 dl), all i all 2,5 liters...
If Jet Cat need 2,5 dl on full throttle per minute and, P 80 is more than inaf (I don't need full throttle all the time) I think that 2,5 liter will be inaf for 8 minutes of flight... Any comments please...

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont)

Retracts.

pic 1:
Only had a few hours tonight and worked on the retracts air lines.
Routed the lines along the holes in the formers to the nose and made a mini panel with 'air fill' and pressure gauge.
All seems to be working OK.
http://www.rcuvideos.com/video/Zirol...tial-gear-test

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont)

retracts (cont)

Initially, I ran the air lines from each main retract along each respective side of the fuse and connected them at the front. This created too many wires so I ran one retracts lines directly to the other retract and connected them with a 'T' fitting and then ran just one line to the front.
I used two HS-81 mini servos to control the air valve and brake valve (UP-6). I used the orange colored air lines for the brakes. Since the brake line also goes only up one side of the fuse, it just occurred to me that the one longer brake line to the opposite gear may cause uneven braking. If this does occur, I'll just make the shorter brake line longer.
The tray to hold the air valve and brake valve has a fat 'T' cut out of it to allow for the nose gear and screws. This tray is the lower level. Above this tray is the receiver/ECU tray.

pic 1:
air valve and brake assembly tray.

pic 2:
lower tray dry fitted over nose gear wooden mounts.

pic 3/4:
gear air lines routed along the left side and then diverted to each gear.

pic 5:
top receiver/ECU tray dry fitted over the air valve/brake tray.

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont)

Air valve/brake tray (cont)
Two hex head servo screws were used to secure this tray to the tops of the front nose gear wooden mounts.

Receiver/ECU tray (cont)
Slots were cut into the tray for velcro straps and the receiver and ECU were secured.
Some short extensions were made to connect the two 5000 MA batteries to the JR power safe receiver.
Extensions were completed for the elevator and rudder and those servos are operating.
The throttle and aux 2 extensions were connected from the receiver to the ECU.
The air valve and brake servos were connected to the receiver but the brake servo made a lot of grinding noise: I'll probably have to replace it with a more powerful HS-225 (especially since it sounded like stripped gears).
The two main cables from the ECU were routed along the fuse to the turbine location (the former holes had to be enlarged for the large cable connectors).

BobH

My Feedback: (2)

Sam, looks like she'll be ready for WOD..

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Yo Bob,
Should be.
I'm assembling this one first since it is far less complicated than assembling the Ziroli P-61 or comparf F4U.
I'll probably be there on Tuesday.

================
Assembly (cont)

air valve/brake tray (cont)

pic 1:
I replaced the small HS-81's with mini HS-225 metal gear servos to handle the needed force to move the brake and overcome the air valve as it tends to stick, once in awhile, when the receiver is first turned on. When first turned on, the HS-81 was chattering because it couldn't move the 'initial resistance' in the air valve.

========
Tail feathers.

pic 2/3:
heavy duty robart ball link control horns connected to HS-5645 servos with dubro 4X40 heavy duty ball links on a metal servo arm for the elevator and rudder.
Five ply plywood was used to re-enforce the control horn mounting area.

pic 4:
Rudder throw.
About an inch, each way.

pic 5:
Elevator throw.
About 7/8" up and 5/8" down.
30% expo on both rudder and elevator.

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont)

Right wing.

The ailerons got hs-5645 servos and hs-645's in the flaps.
As with the elevator, dubro heavy duty 4X40 ball links on the servo arm and robarts ball link control horn on the aileron.
The flap has dubro's HD 4x40 ball link on both ends.

pic 1:
Dubro HD hinges epoxied on the aileron and TE of the wing.
One long wire is used for the hinge pin.

pic 2-5:
Aileron and flap secured.
Robart pocket hinges on the flaps for easy removal.
One long wire as hinge pin on the ailerons.

pic 6:
Aileron assembly.

pic 7:
flap servo.

pic 8:
Flap deflection of 35-40 degrees.

pic 9/10:
Aileron deflection of 5/8".

pic 11/12:
Tail feathers and one wing done.

BobH

My Feedback: (2)

Sam, a picture of my Panther, just for you. Nothing but the finest in Scale from me! LOL.. its an EDF RCLander...fyi.

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Bob,
My view; as long as it's scale, I like it.

===========================

Assembly (cont)

I made four 33" extensions for the flaps and ailerons that go from the receiver to the inner wing.
The aileron and flap and servos were finished on the left wing.
I had to make the short brake line to one wheel the same length as the longer air line to the other wheel so both brakes released properly as one would release but the other did not completely release.
I burned out the brake servo due to improper set up of the slave to the master mixing.
(see below for details)

pic 1:
Four 33" servo extensions made up.

pic 2:
Colored tape from home depot to easily identify which extensions connect to each other.

pic 3:
One brake line made longer (into a loop) to match the length of the other brake line.

pic 4:
Didn't want to remove the servo so I drilled a hole in the rib so I could use a screw driver to remove the servo screw for adjustments.

pic 5/6:
Left wing done.

=====
How I got the brakes to work on down elevator on a JR X9303 2.4

pic 7:
Select MIX 1 and put in ELEV>AUX 3 (right side lever: could also select aux 4)
Then change the graph to have a straight line left of the x-axis and 'normal' to the right of the x-axis. This slaves the aux 3 to the elevator and only moves aux 3 on the 'down' movement of the elevator.

pic 8:
Then select SW SELECT and turn on MIX (MIX is the top right toggle on the transmitter).
This allows the above aux 3 to move when the MIX toggle is moved up (down is off).

pic 9:
Next, select TRAVEL ADJUSTMENT and select AUX 3 and put in 0 for left column and 150 for right column.
This is an important last step (without this, my servo burned up trying to move the brake valve when it was already at max movement).
When you move aux 3 (right side lever), the zero on the left side will not force the servo arm past the brake valve limit. If you want the brakes to be on, say when starting the turbine without having to hold 'down' elevator, then move aux 3 to the 'on' position.
It took me about an hour of 'fiddling' to finally figure out how not to burn up the servo.

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont)

Posting this morning as I was 'beat' last night around 11 PM.

Steering:
pic 1/2:
I over killed and used a HS-645 servo for the nose steering (don't want any gear stripping).
Put simple loops on the oleo to prevent any 'hang ups' while the gear is being 'lowered'.
Some 4/40 clevises with adjustable threaded rods on the servo end.
Servo mounted on front of tank tray.
Some sullivan yellow push rod glued into one former for wire guides.

============
Exhaust pipe.
To save a few bucks (about $85), I bought a used exhaust pipe that was too long and has to be cut to make it fit.
Initially, I was going to just cut off the required amount so the end of the pipe just sticks out the back by a quarter inch, but the end of the pipe has some corrugated (like cardboard) metal holding the outside pipe in alignment for the outside pipe.
I could have, probably, just used four screws and about 8 nuts to hold the two pipes in alignment with each other but I decided to re-attached the last 2" to the front piece after cutting out the 'waste'.
The first cut was with a band saw to remove the back 2". I used my curved tin snips to trim a neat edge along the front edge of this 2" piece.
I want the back of the front exhaust piece to overlap an inch over the back piece so I aligned the back of the 2" piece where the end of the front total length is to be and then marked one inch back and cut along that line.
To connect the two pieces, I made multiple cuts along the back of the front piece 3/4" long and every 3/4" around the parameter. The back piece then has to be slide into the front piece getting all those slotted cuts inside the back piece. I used the scrap cut out as a sleeve to guide the outer slots while using a jewelers screw driver to guide each of the inner slots into the back piece.
The outer wall is the cooler wall so I used aluminum duct tape to hold the two piece together.
(This is probably all as clear as mud!)
(knowing now what I had to do to get the proper length, I'd probably just buy the correct length, even though the price was half)

pic 3:
Band saw for initial cut of 2" back piece.

pic 4:
The ends were then 'cleaned up' with some tin snips.

pic 5:
I marked where the total length is, aligned the 2" back piece to it and marked off 1" back for where to cut the front pipe.

pic 6:
curved tin snips to cut the two walls of the exhaust pipe.

pic 7/8:
I made multiple 3/4" long cuts every 3/4" along both walls.
The front piece was then slid into the back piece insuring all cut 'tabs' are on the inside.
Those cut tabs will create some turbulence at the end but I don't think it will be significant as 18 lbs of thrust should be more than enough for the speeds that I'll be flying.

pic 9:
The corrugation holds the two walls in alignment with each other.

pic 10:
Front of exhaust pipe 5/8" behind the turbine.

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont)

hatch cover:
pic 1/2:
A blind nut epoxied to the base of the front of the fuse and a #6 screw to hold the front.
The back got two aluminum 1/4" rods for alignment.

Balance:
pic 3:
So far, the plane is just a little nose heavy.

pic 4:
The three receiver remotes attached to the fuse: two along the bottom and one at the top of the fuse.

Turbine installation (cont)

pic 5:
The gas and propane ECU controlled shut off valves mounted on each side of the nose servo.
A small piece of 1/8" thick ply epoxied to allow the valves to be screwed to the tank tray as the bottom of the valves aren't flat.
Note that the electric gas pump is put into one of the holes in the former (perfect fit).

pic 6:
Propane manual shut off valve put along the top and between two of the formers and the propane tank mounted vertically (best for propane).

pic 7:
Dry fit of two main tanks and VAT.

jetster

Sam mount your fuel filter straight up & down,less chance of a flame out from traped air in filter. Rich

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Yo Rich,
Thanks for the tip.
pic 1:
I saw that in the manual and got the gas filter mounted vertically.
The propane is mounted at about a 45 degree angle: I figured that it's only for 'startup' and the worst that can happen is a 'shut down' on the ground.
VAT at 45 degree angle to insure no air bubbles.

================
Assembly (cont)

pic 2/3:
11 oz sullivan saddle tank and Dick Bennett's 64 oz tanks.
Saddle tank stopper replaced with gas compatible plug and all 5/32" tubing used for the large flow needed for turbines. Also, 5/32" brass tubing used to the clunkers to insure they don't ever bend forward.

pic 4/5:
Three velcro straps holding the two tanks to the tank tray.
Flow from turbine (via the pump and shut off valve[manual & ECU controlled) to VAT to saddle tank to 64 oz tank. (some plastic ties yet to be done on the tubing connections)

pic 6:
Turbine connections.

pic 7:
The only thing left is to secure the on/off switch, ECU I/O interface and air filler.

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Assembly (cont)

pic 1:
A mini panel across the fuse holds the receiver on/off soft switch, air fill/pressure gauge and the I/O board to the ECU.

pic 2:
Except for the cockpit and canopy: "that's all, folks".

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Initial P70 test in panther.

After filling up the tanks, a 'pump test volt' option is implemented (one time only for new tank install) that just runs the fuel pump to remove all air bubbles. The fuel line is removed from the turbine and routed to a bottle to catch the excess fuel.
The fail safe is critical and AMA required.
The ECU has you set the min/max trim on the throttle trim and stick, plus the three positions of the aux switch (if using 2 switch starting procedure).
Start up and shut down are easy.
After shut down, the motor runs the fan to cool the engine to below 100 C and takes about a minute.
The manual valves are turned off for the propane and fuel and the ECU battery is manually disconnected.
To be sure the plane didn't move, I put the nose against the outside wall of my shop with a blanket for 'nose' protection.

video test of P70:
http://www.rcuvideos.com/video/Zirol...itial-P70-test

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Miscellaneous.

I drilled the canopy every 3/4" and used #0X3/16" screws to hold the canopy to the hatch.
I used a cheap cut off pilot: in the Fall, I'll put in a cockpit and dress it up.
The aluminum duct tape on the exhaust didn't work. I used acetone to remove the melted glue and then drilled a series of holes between the two exhaust pipes, and used #0X3/16" screws to hold them together. JB weld then was put on each screw head to prevent the screws from vibrating out.
I moved the ECU battery from the nose to the side of the tanks to get the CG (dry state).
This week, while at the CARDS flyin, I hope to get some taxi time in to 'shake out' any 'bugs'.
I had to 're-bind' the plane again to get proper failsafe.
The throttle servo throws need to be put to +/-100%, then bind the receiver, then set the throttle throws to +/-50% and then 'bind' the ECU for min/max throttle/trim and the three aux positions (at least on the JR 2.4).

pic 1:
Canopy screwed on and cheap plastic pilot used.

pic 2:
ECU battery move next to the tanks.

pic 3:
Exhaust pipe drilled and small screws used to hold the two pieces together.
Since the pipe is very flexible, I used a plastic jar lid that fit inside the pipe and then some 1/16" thick brass to prevent from drilling into the inside pipe.

pic 4:
JB weld put on each screw head.

pic 5:
ready to 'rock-n-roll'.

DENTO

HEY SAM
SOMTHING For for you to do in the fall ,Glass canopy frame NOT TO HARD prity sure you can handle it .
REGARDS
JOHN

samparfitt

My Feedback: (43)

Yo John,
It looks good.
A canopy frame always adds a lot of realism to the cockpit area.